Rome: The Eternal City

Within the retreat centers, monasteries, and cathedrals that Linn and I have visited there is always a pervasive sense of holy presence. The sacredness of such places hangs thick in the air. Therefore I was eagerly expecting St. Peter’s at the Vatican to exude such divine presence as I have not yet experienced. But it was not there. I did not find the Vatican to be the “center of spirituality” that I thought it would be. Actually, because there is nothing of the substance of truth outside of the Spirit, all that is spiritual is center. In this sense the Vatican itself cannot be the “center” of spirituality. It is, however, a hub of that body of fallen believers struggling toward the redemption which the Spirit of Christ brings. It is the “church militant.”

My initial impression was one of officialdom; of institution, government, authority. And, indeed, the Vatican is the center of government of the Catholic Church. Judging by the statuary in St. Peter’s of popes sitting on “judgment seats” I even thought that this might be nothing more than a monument to human beings.

But as we spent more time around the Vatican something else was creeping up from underneath. I began to grasp the world-embracing scope of the Vatican. It came on me as we attended the pope’s Wednesday open audience in the Audience Hall. Here the pope acknowledged and addressed, each in their native language, groups of pilgrims from all over the world assembled together in an enormous hall. The brotherhood and sisterhood that comes together here under the cross of Christ, for the cross towers over all, becomes more than an idea or an ideal. One is absorbed into it.

I found here a strange admixture of personal intimacy conjoined with the world-embracing quality of the Vatican. Far from feeling lost within a global mass of humanity I felt my personal uniqueness actually being affirmed. I sensed a part of me coming alive that is not compartmentalized within an ego developed over a lifetime of living within an individualistic culture. Personal uniqueness finds its fullness within a sense of connection with the whole of God’s created order. Within a cultural context that is not so severely individualistic I began to understand that the Christ-Spirit is not individualistic, but neither can one properly call it collectivist. It is more like all-embracing. Only in our connection with essential “Humanity” as God has purposed humankind to exist does one find the fullness of one’s own human being. This is what I find the spirit of the Vatican to be; connectivity with “human being” as being restored through Christ. One understands that in Christ the divine quality of the human soul is overcoming its bondage to the world. In this sense Rome embodies the coming into being of the Church Victorious. 

A short taxi ride from the Vatican lie the ruins of the great Roman Empire. How ironic it seems that this once great empire held itself so superior to the seemingly insignificant body of believers that was the seedbed of the Christian Church. They were stamped as enemies of the state and dragged into the arena to be torn apart by wild beasts. You know, they really didn’t have very good organizational skills. The way you’re supposed to do it is to go out and find influential people in the community to form a board of directors who can promote your organization and get the funds coming in. It certainly doesn’t make much sense to go against the powers that be. By all rights this new organization should have fallen by the wayside long ago. But these who were the lowly and despised of the world had the eyes to see an unseen kingdom and the ears to hear an unheard message that is overcoming the world.

The final outcome of the weak in Christ

Rome is a place. Yet it is the eternal caught up within time and space. It is an historical proclamation of the eternal victory working in each of us. Here is where the apostle Paul was imprisoned and brought before Caesar, where Peter was bound in chains and crucified, where Christians were persecuted and martyred. Here the Church of Rome met secretly and defied the social conventions imposed on them to worship other gods. Here is where the mightiest empire on earth attempted to crush this neophyte community. Through the perspective of history the eternal victory pokes through. The splendor of the Roman Empire which exalted itself far above the “foolishness” of the gospel now lies in a heap of rubble below the monuments that today proclaim the faith of those early Christians.

Final outcome of the mighty of the world

What I sensed in Rome in the final analysis was the firm center of the church that has endured longer than any other organization on earth, which overcame the most powerful empire on earth (the very stones of the Coliseum and other buildings of the empire were confiscated and used to build the churches of Rome), which has endured sufferings and persecutions, has gone through times of corruption within itself – bad popes, selfish practices, the evils of the inquisition – yet continues to stand. One wants to entwine one’s life into its solid core. Such is not to sacrifice one’s self to religion but to expand into the liberty of its spirit.